Unfinished Business
by cryingblacktears
Summary: Crossover with ghost whisperer, but you don't need to watch it to get this...Neil's spirit is still earthbound and he needs help to cross over. My first DPS fanfic...enjoy!chapter 3 up!
1. Chapter 1

**AN: Okies...if you watch ghost whisperer you'll know that it doesn't fit with the DPS timeline, but this idea was bugging me for a while, so I decided to write it. The timeline is that it's 1964, 5 years after Neil died...and Melinda from ghost whisperer lives in '64 too... **

**If you don't watch ghost whisperer (and you don't have to, really to understand this), I started with the intro that plays at the beginning of the show..**

**Names: Melinda Gordon – The ghost whisperer**

**Jim Clancy - her husband. He's a paramedic**

**They live in a town called Grandview, which to fit with the story I've moved to very near to Welton Academy. I **_**think **_**that's enough for this to make sense...if it doesn't, tell me! **

Unfinished Business

_My name is Melinda Gordon. I'm married, I live in a small town and I own an antiques shop. I might be just like you, but from the time I was a little girl I knew I could talk to the dead. Earthbound spirits, my grandmother called them. In order to tell you my story, I have to tell you theirs_

"Thou speak'st aright!  
I am that merry wanderer of the night!"

Melinda frowns. On the stage, she can see two Pucks. One, the made up, exuberant actor, the other a skinny, dark-haired boy wearing nothing but stage leggings. Nobody else seems to have noticed him, which, for her, usually means one thing. Nobody else can see him.

As the play goes on, the 'ghost Puck' continues to follow the actor around the stage, speaking his lines, mimicking his actions.

"If we shadows have offended,  
Think but this, and all is mended,  
That you have but slumber'd here  
While these visions did appear.  
And this weak and idle theme,  
No more yielding but a dream,  
Gentles, do not reprehend:  
if you pardon, we will mend:  
And, as I am an honest Puck,  
If we have unearned luck  
Now to 'scape the serpent's tongue,  
We will make amends ere long;  
Else the Puck a liar call;  
So, good night unto you all.  
Give me your hands, if we be friends,  
And Robin shall restore amends."

As both Pucks speak their last lines, Melinda sees the ghost looking towards the back of the theatre, as though expecting to see someone there. And when the curtain falls, she's certain she sees a tear make its way slowly down the boy's cheek.

"So what did you think?" Jim asks as they make their way out of the theatre. When she doesn't reply, he tries again "Mel?"

Melinda shakes her head, to clear her thoughts. "It was great. Really great Jim" She smiles at him, but continues looking around the foyer. "But I saw...there was a ghost following Puck around the stage,"

"Is he here now?" Jim asks. He follows Melinda's eyes as she scans the foyer for the ghost.

"Yeah. He's right..." She walks towards a seemingly empty corner of the foyer. Jim sighs, smiles slightly, and follows her

Neil watches the people come out of the theatre. They're talking, he knows they're talking about the play, the acting. The way they talked about him, when he performed five years ago...

Then he sees a woman, young, pretty, walking towards his corner, purposefully. She looks straight at him, meets his eyes.

_She can see me! But how? I'm..._

**AN: So...what did you think? Should I carry on? Does it make **_**any**_** sense at all...Reviews make me happy**

**Smiles**

**--CBT**


	2. Chapter 2

_She can see me!'_

"I was good," Neil says softly. "I was really good"

The woman – Melinda, he heard her husband call her – looks at him with compassionate eyes. "Yes, you were,"

Neil smiles sadly. "My dad didn't think so," he sighs.

"What happened?" Melinda asks him

"Mel," her husband taps her lightly on the shoulder. "Mel,"

"One minute, Jim," she says

Neil looks around. Even in the crowded foyer, their conversation has attracted a knot of curious onlookers.

"Is she alright?" one asks

Jim gives a tight smile. "Fine," he says

Melinda turns to tell the spirit to follow her, but he has vanished from sight.

Neil is back in the small, quaint looking shop, back at the desk that came in the day before. His father's desk. The place where he died.

It's been five years, and he's had to follow that damned desk around. The first six months had been the worst. Stuck in the house that had become his prison, having to hear his mother cry every night. He hadn't meant to hurt her like that, he'd just wanted to…

"_Dammit!!" _Neil shouts, although he knows it's pointless. Suicide was meant to be the easy way out, but instead he's just gone from one prison to another. _'Is this hell? If it is, what did I do to deserve this?'_

A few miles away from 'Same as it never was antiques', Melinda Gordon is sat in her living room, going through a pile of obituaries she got from the library. It's not often she has so little to go on with a spirit, but even a shot in the dark hits the target once in a while, so she figures it's worth a try.

After almost three hours, she finally gets something. The title reads: 'Neil Perry, 17: A promising life cut tragically short' and the picture beneath it looks very much like her spirit. Melinda reads on:

_By Tom Perry_

_My son Neil Perry had his whole life ahead of him, but one impulsive decision means that he will now never get to live it, and that I will never see him grow up and fulfil his dream of becoming a doctor. Before he died, Neil attended Welton academy, where he was a popular student who achieved top grades in every class. _

_The reason my son is dead is because one teacher at his school abused his position and encouraged him to follow an obsession, which would have faded in time, even though he knew it was against my wishes, and ultimately, was not the right thing for Neil._

_My family now mourns the loss of a much loved, intelligent young man whose life was snatched away from him before he had the chance to live it. _

Later that night, Neil tries to pull himself away from the desk, to find Melinda. He needs her to find his friends, and Mr Keating. He needs them to know…

**AN: I really dislike the ending. Like, a **_**lot**_**…but I don't want to give everything away in the 2nd chapter, so I decided to end it by trailing off…sorry!**

**And the next chapter probably wont be up as quickly…but I'll try to get it done by the end of the week…reviews make me dance around the computer like a crazy person…hehe**

**Smiles**

**--CBT**


	3. Chapter 3

**AN: Sorry for the wait!! But it's here, and it's longer that 1000 words. That's long, by my standards...I don't own DPS or Ghost Whisperer...because if I did I would be...well, a lot older, for a start...hope you like the chapter...**

Chapter three

Melinda wakes with a jolt. Jim is still sleeping peacefully beside her, unaware that their room has an extra occupant.

"Neil?" she whispers, careful not to wake Jim.

Neil's eyes widen. "Do you read minds as well?" He asks

She smiles "No. I found your obituary in the library."

Neil frowns. He'd watched his father writing that obituary and tried as hard as he could to erase those words form the page, screaming at the top of his lungs "That's not me! That's not who I am! Why couldn't you see that!" but for all his efforts, he'd only managed to knock the typewriter over a couple of times.

"I never wanted to be a doctor," He mutters bitterly. "It's what _he _wanted for me,"

"Is that why you can't cross over?" Melinda asks "Do you need to tell him?"

"No!" Neil's voice becomes a shout, and for a split second, his eyes light up furiously. "No," He says again, quieter, sadder this time. "When I died – "His voice shakes slightly "I left my friends without an explanation, a reason. "

Melinda nods. "What about the man your father mentioned in the obituary – the teacher?"

"Mr Keating had nothing, _nothing_ to do with what happened. He was the only person who understood...everything. He helped me see what I really wanted to do. I'd always wanted to act, but of course my father wouldn't let me. He was the only teacher who told me not to listen to my father, that he didn't know what was best for me, that _I _knew what was best for me."

"What happened?" She asks softly.

"I'll show you,"

Melinda blinks, and suddenly she's not in bed, talking to Neil, but in a bedroom of a posh looking boys school. There's nothing to say that she's not really here, except that there are two Neils. One is standing beside her, watching the scene unfold sadly. The other is standing on the bed, in superhero pose, wearing a blanket like a cloak, and declaring triumphantly "So, I'm gonna act. Yes, yes! I'm gonna be an actor! Ever since I can remember I've wanted to try this. I even tried to go to summer stock auditions last year, but, of course, my father wouldn't let me. For the first time in my whole life I know what I wanna do - "

The vision-Neil grabs his friend's papers and tosses them in the air. Beside her, Neil smiles.

"That's Todd," he says "he's – I mean we were roommates.

"And for the first time I'm gonna do it whether my father wants me to or not! Carpe diem!"

""That's Latin for 'seize the day''" Neil supplies. "It was sort of my philosophy, back then.

The scene dissolves, and the vision-Neil is now running through the corridors, banging on doors and shouting excitedly "I got the part! I'm gonna play Puck! _I'm gonna play Puck!"_

And suddenly they're not there anymore, they're in Neils room again, but the atmosphere is considerably different.

"That's my father" Neil whispers "He can't see us, right?"

"No, he can't" says Melinda

"...Tomorrow," says Neil's father "You go to them and tell them you're quitting!"

"No. I can't. I have the main part, the performance is tomorrow night!"

"I don't care if the world comes to an end tomorrow night! You are through with that play! Is that clear? _Is that clear?"_

"Screw you," says Neil

"Yes sir," says the vision-Neil

And then they're in an office, the vision-Neil is talking to -

"Mr Keating," Neil tells Melinda

"I just talked to my father." says the vision-Neil "He's making me quit the play at Henley Hall. Acting's everything to me. I- But he doesn't know. He- I can see his point. We're not a rich family like Charlie's, and we- But he's planning the rest of my life for me, and I- He's never asked me what _I_ want."

"Have you ever told your father what you've just told me?" asks Keating

"I can't talk to him this way," says the vision-Neil resignedly.

Keating looks steadily at Neil "Then you're acting for him, too. You're playing the part of the dutiful son. I know this sounds impossible, but you have to talk to him. You have to show him who you are, what your heart is."

Neil almost laughs, but he is near tears "I know what he'll say. He'll tell me acting's just a whim, and that I should forget it. He'll just tell me to put it out of my mind 'for my own good,"

"You are not an indentured servant." Keating says "If it's not a whim for you, you prove it to him by your conviction and your passion. You show him that. And if he still doesn't believe you, well, by then you'll be out of school and you can do anything you want".

"He made it sound so easy," says Neil. Looking back now, he wonders what would have happened if he'd followed Keating's advice. Would he still be alive now? Would he be an actor? Or would he be studying unhappily at Harvard, training to be a doctor?

The vision Neil wipes away a stray tear**. "**No." He says "What about the play? The show's tomorrow night.

"Well, you have to talk to him before tomorrow night." Says Keating.

Then they're riding in Neil's father's car after the play. The car melts away, and they're watching the vision-Neil stand up to his father

"I've got to tell you what _I_ feel!"

"You told him?" Melinda asks happily. "Good for you!"

Neil shakes his head "Wait," he says simply.

"What?" says his father angrily "What? Tell me what you feel. What is it?"

There is a long, agonising silence that stretches by the second, like an elastic band about to snap.

Neil wants to scream at his vision-self, tell him to show his passion, his fire for acting. But he knows it's useless. You can't change the past, so what's the point trying?

"Is it more of this-this _acting_ business?" Mr. Perry asks "Because you can forget that,"

Neil sits back down with a sigh "Nothing," he says.

The next scene happens in flashes. The vision-Neil is in his bedroom, then walking down the hallway, into a study. And then he's behind his father's desk with a gun in his hand, pressing it to his head. His finger tightens on the trigger. Melinda cover her ears and turns her head, knowing what he's about to do.

Neil shuts his eyes tightly, not wanting to see his own death, but at the same time musing that he's too squeamish to watch this, yet he had no problem doing it.

There's a gunshot, and then darkness. Neil and Melinda are back in her dark bedroom. Melinda is breathing hard, as though she has just run a race. Neil is standing in the same spot, tears silently coursing down his cheeks.

"It's been five years." He whispers "It shouldn't hurt this much,"

"I know," says Melinda, not bothering to keep her voice down "But it does,"

"What does, honey?" asks Jim

"Doesn't matter," Melinda says "I'm sorry I woke you,"

Jim nods, understanding.

Melinda turns back to Neil, but he's gone.

**AN: I know, I know...a lot of movie script hides in corner but the other way of Neil telling his story would be lots and lots of dialogue...so I thought this was the best way? **

**Reviews, comments, suggestions...are all very, very welcome...:D**

**Smiles**

**--CBT**


End file.
